Michael Larsen called 911 after a man was crying for help in a ravine near his apartment. He realized the next day that man was wanted for a grisly killing of an Aloha woman.

Author:
KGW Staff

Published:
11:23 PM PST January 27, 2018

BEAVERTON, Ore. – When Michael Larsen called 911 Thursday night, he didn’t realize the magnitude of his call.

At around 11:30 p.m., Larsen woke up to his daughter pounding on his bedroom door.

“I went to bed, and then I was woken up by my daughter pounding on our door, saying, ‘Somebody’s out in the woods yelling for help,’” he said.

Larsen investigated, and like his daughter said, there was a man in a ravine below his apartment. Larsen said the man kept yelling “help” over and over, even when they asked his name.

Ravine near Larsen's apartment

“I called 911. Then she told him help is on the way. And that was the only time he responded appropriately. He said, ‘Thank you.’ So then just a few minutes later all the police just started converging on this area,” Larsen said.

Police converged, in part, because the man asking for help outside Larsen’s apartment was suspected of killing and reportedly dismembering a 28-year-old woman. Sara Zghoul’s body was found in two suitcases in a car earlier Thursday night in Aloha.

Sara Zghoul

“There was over 20 police officers down there looking for him and looking at him,” Larsen said.

Officers took the suspect, whose identity has not been released, into custody. Authorities say the suspect tried to kill himself while in the ravine.

Larsen saw news headlines Friday morning and put the story together himself.

“That’s when it really hit me that I was talking to a murderer right underneath our balcony. Very scary,” he said.